Showing Love

How can you show love to a person that twists everything into being abuse? I have no idea!

My family and I struggle with this. My mom loves my GCM sister, she is her daughter. How can she just say good-bye to her? She sends her gifts at Christmas and on her birthday. How does my sister respond? She thinks my mom is trying to pull her back into her “crazy”. Somehow my sister thinks this is passive aggressive. I don’t get it. She will not say any of this to my mom. She doesn’t even acknowledge my mom at all. She will just talk to all her new friends about it. All my mom wants to do is show my sister she loves her by sending her a gift. She doesn’t want to ignore or treat her differently than her other children.

I too send a gift every once in a while to let her know I love her and am thinking of her. I also know my sister is not living in reality right now and if she ever comes out of it, I want her to realize I never left her and I am there for her.

So what do you do with someone like this? Do we just not send gifts or thinking of you cards since she twists it into abuse? Will she be happy if we ignore her like she ignores us? Can we in good consciousness ignore my sister? We would feel like we are turning our backs on her if we never did anything to acknowledge her existence. It is a terrible situation. She changed her personality then her name. It is like the person we know and love doesn’t exist anymore. Maybe we should just consider her as dead? My family is so torn. We don’t know what to do (except we do know we can always pray for her!).

We are all trying to figure out the “right” way to live. It is sad that leaving family behind was her choice. Personally, I find relying on online support a kind of thinking error. Trading real relationships for the virtual ones. Consider N.A.M.I. it might give you some peace and assuage your guilt and worry. Remember,God is in charge; keep the pipeline open to your sister, one day she may feel safe enough to resume a relationship. Be gentle, forgiving and one day you may have your sister back.

Dear exposegcm, I don’t think you rely on on line support. I think you rely on The Blood of Christ and the real Family and Friends Christ has given you. I think you are salting the earth with your site, just like you are supposed to. I think you can do this because even thought your sister is lost right now, it is still well with your soul. Not to mention we have a good shepherd who is always after those lost sheep. He knows the sheep in his fold are safe. Stay wise in The Word. Wisdom resides in the house of sorrow.